Can Someone Explain This To Me Please?

[hedrick]

My greatest fear is that our souls are immortal, and I will continue on in some form after death, forever. I want the option of non-existence. I would trade this dumpster fire of a world (and anything that comes after it) for non-existence this very moment, if I could.

It seems highly unlikely that you'll be stuck in something like this world forever. Most likely it will be something you'll consider worthwhile. Either that it will be much worse than here.

I'd guess that it will be something we're not thinking of. If God is anything like what he seems to be, he's from outside the universe. Remember that time and space are both part of the universe. So his realm is likely to be *very* different. I don't think we'll be in an existence just like this except it goes on infinitely.

Of course Scripture itself doesn't really even talk about heaven, except as something temporary. The most common image is a renewed earth.

 

[LastAttempt]

@hedrick
I guess what I'm getting at is: I did not ask for this (as far as I know). I do not want to be here, and I am terrified that I've had an immortal soul pushed on me which will exist in some form, forever. That's not fair. I want non-existence, and I've wanted it since I was 13. I spent ages 13-19 asking God every night to just put me back the way I was before birth. I gave up when I turned 20. The answer was no. I concur that God's realm is likely incomprehensible to our puny sheep brains, but I'm not even interested in finding out anymore. I just want out. Permanently. I'm desperately searching for a reason to stay here.

 

[mmksparbud]

LastAttempt:

Well---you're not the first with such questions, definitely won't be the last. For years I was angry at God. Not that I did not believe in Him,, I thought how could you claim to love us and let me go through the hell I had to go through growing up, and seeing the world and the evil and then I found out about WW2 and the holocaust and I totally flipped out---how could you sit there and do nothing about this??!! I also wondered how stupid was Lucifer to turn on a supposedly all powerful God when He sees Him all the time, didn't make sense that he was so stupid. I walked away from Him.

Luckily---He did not walk away from me. It took about 30 years, but I did come back. I slowly learned a few things. God does not force---unfortunately. Sometimes I would prefer that He had just somehow forced me to do the right thing! This whole free will thing rather stumped me. On the one hand I would rail against Him---"What am I--just a puppet to do what you want?" Later I would think--if there was a button I could push that would take away my free will I would push it so fast it would make your head spin, seems rather wonderful to never do anything wrong.
Took me years to understand what love is and what it entails---and free will is what must be or there is no love. You must love enough to let the one you love walk away from you. It took a divorce to teach me that. For someone to be forced to stay with you without a choice, is slavery. It garners resentment not love in return. It also took me years to comprehend that my father, and everyone else, including Hitler, has a right to their own life's choices. Everyone pays for the consequences of those choices, if not in this world, then the next. And God did step in-He stepped in and saved peoples lives through other people, He stepped and guided some people in ending the war, He steps in sometimes in large ways, sometimes in very small ways to direct without force. The day will come when the time here is up--and He returns and makes everything new again and restores the world to what it should be. Sin will not rear it's ugly head again--why not?
Think of it as a grand play, watched by a whole universe, not just us. All the host of heaven, all those angels that did not rebel, but perhaps were left wondering --was Lucifer right? He was led away by his own beauty it says--he looked at only himself and that is why he turned away from God. He forgot it was God who created him so beautiful, looking at himself, he wanted to be God. And he cleverly led the others away--how--you want a detailed picture of how he did it, look up Absalom. How Absalom led people away from King David, his father, is just the way Lucifer did it.
God could have wiped out Lucifer and his followers---that would have left everyone to serve Him out of fear, not love---He let the whole thing play out--so everyone could see, once and for all, what sin leads to. And it led to the cross. When the universe saw the Savior, tortured, and hanging on that cross---their once beautiful, glorious King, now beaten savagely, naked--there was no doubt remaining in the mind of anyone, how evil Lucifer was, how horrible sin is. Forever, Jesus will bear the marks of His crucifixion--that is the deterrent to sin in the remade earth, those marks.
It is not an everlasting burning hell that is the deterrent--when read correctly, that is not what the bible says will happen. There are many threads on that topic and you can read them for more information with the verses to back it up--there is always a discussion going on the subject. The wicked will pay for their sins--"according to their works"---not forever. That does not go with the character of God or all those verses either. There will be justice--and only God knows the heart and can inflict that justice. It says there will be no tears, no pain, no sorrow in the new world---an everlasting hell would inflict those continually. God is love, even His justice--the wicked would not be happy in the new world with Him. They will pay and then they die the 2nd death--a permanent death, not a permanent dying. They will simply perish.

We do not have an immortal soul---even Adam and Eve had to have access to the tree of life to live.

 

[Phil 1:21]

I really want to believe like I did before, but too many things just make no sense to me.

Satan's first line of attack is to create doubt (Genesis 3:1-4). When satan comes after you, turn to God.

 

[Project Panda]

I was raised in a devout Christian household. I believed. I prayed. I had faith. I was also very young. Later, once I had gained a more sophisticated intellect, I began to notice that what I believe did not match up with what I was seeing every day, and what I knew of human history (horrible and disgusting).

Everyone seems to agree on the premise that God loves us, and desires to be with us forever. But in order to be with him, you have to go through a pass/fail test called life. Consider all the people throughout history who have lived and died. It’s a number that completely dwarfs the number of people alive at present, more on that later. Now consider how many of those people likely passed the test. Keep in mind that God murdered entire cities for doing so poorly on the test he didn’t even wait until they died to send them to forever-hell (not just non-existence like the time before birth, but eternal punishment for a finite life). I think it’s safe to say the vast majority of people who have lived and died here did NOT pass the test for one reason or another. After all, it’s easier for a camel to fit through the eye of a needle etc etc…

Setting that aside for a moment, consider the fact that the majority of people alive at the moment are not Christians. God must be very disappointed (again…more) because Christianity, while being a major world religion, is totally eclipsed by the other major religions, population-wise. That isn’t even counting the atheists and the I’m-not-sures. So, God doesn’t get what he wants? Why? Because free-will is more important? Seriously, God’s success rate looks very, very low – like an idea that appears good in theory but fails in execution. He even had to drown ALL of us at one point because things were going so badly. This is the etch-a-sketch version of creation. This is the absent watch-maker which, sadly, makes more sense to me every day. People say they have experienced the hand of God in their lives, but all I see is coincidence. It’s a thing, guys. It happens.

Free-will obviously existed before we did, if the Bible is to be believed. God already created a cadre of angels, seemingly on a ranking system since Lucifer was the main dude in charge. But Lucifer, having intimate knowledge of God’s omniscience and power, figured he could challenge God and win? Wait, what? Was he stupid? How am I supposed to believe that? And to make matters worse, ONE THIRD of God’s soldiers followed Lucifer? So even within God’s own angels he has a failing grade: 66.6% is an F+. If God is so awesome (in the real context of that word) why would his creations rebel? Because free-will? That makes NO sense to me. I would happily give up free will to get out of this place (earth).

To sum up: God created lots of angels, then 33% of them left, figuring they could beat God. Then God created an unthinkable number of human beings for the specific purpose of populating hell forever, as punishment for their finite lives. He knew what he was doing and what would happen. This constitutes the vast majority of the entire human race, living and dead, which really looks like failure (or, at the very least not love) to me. And lastly, our only guide comes in the form of an ancient book, written by ancient people in antiquated languages (classical Hebrew, Aramaic and Greek) which have NO PUNCTUATION, VERB TENSE OR EVEN SPACES BETWEEN WORDS. In Greek, you can’t tell the difference between

God is now here

And

God is nowhere

Because what you're looking at is Godisnowhere. Or maybe it's "God I Snow Here". You don't know.

There’s a reason why “It’s all Greek to me” is an expression. The result: A crazy long book we have no hope of understanding unless we are fluent in classical Hebrew, ancient Aramaic and Greek, and can time-travel in order to understand the social context of all these documents when they were written. The book is so vague and open to misinterpretation it seems unlikely anyone can decipher its original meaning. That’s probably why there’s 150 different flavors of Christianity. And furthermore, within this document, he calls us sheep. I don’t know if you’ve ever been around sheep, but they are the dumbest things ever to walk the earth. Astoundingly stupid. How could us sheep ever decipher the Bible in any meaningful way? If God is Love, I don’t feel it, I don’t see it, and believe me, I’m looking.

I really want to believe like I did before, but too many things just make no sense to me. Baaaaaaa.

Look around at the world you live in, the universe. It's telling us something about why we are here, and it doesn't take a genius to work it out.

Everything in existence is in a giant relationship factory (One thing effecting another) For what exactly?
Maybe for the sole purpose of learning.
Why do we need to learn? Maybe for the sole purpose of having a relationship.

Which I thinks comes next.

 

[DennisTate]

We were talking about Jahweh. He has the right to kill.

If you create killers and tell them not to kill, this is what you get. The free will does not explain our cruel nature. So they just told everyone it was the devils fault in denial of their own nature. Someone has to be the bad guy.

But when Satan participates in the killing of somebody.........
and influences a group of people toward committing murder.....
could it be partly so that they can graduate to a much higher level?

Could the Devil..... at least to some degree... have good intentions for the long term?

Howard Storm Ph. D:
"I asked how God could let the Holocaust of World War II happen. We were transported to a railway station as a long train of freight cars was being unloaded of its human cargo. The guards were screaming and beating the people into submission. The people were Jewish men, women, and children. Exhausted from hunger and thirst, they were totally disoriented from the ordeal of being rounded up and sent on a long journey to an unknown destination. They believed that they were going to work camps, and that their submission to the brutality of the guards was the only way to survive.

We went to the area where the selection process was taking place and heard the guards talking about "the Angel Maker." We went to the place the guards were referring to as "the Angel Maker," which was a series of ovens. I saw piles of naked corpses being loaded into the ovens, and I began to cry. Jesus said to me, "These are the people God loves." Then he said, "Look up." Rising out of the smoke of the chimneys, I saw hundreds of people being met by thousands of angels taking them up into the sky. There was great joy in the faces of the people, and there appeared to be no trace of a memory of the horrendous suffering they had just endured. How ironic that the guards sarcastically called the ovens "the Angel Maker."

I asked how God could allow this to happen. They told me that this was not God's will. This was an abomination to God. God wants this never to happen again. This was the sacrifice of an innocent people to whom God had given the law to be an example, a light, to the rest of the world. This Holocaust was breaking God's heart. The anguish that Jesus was suffering at the slaughter of his people was too much for me to bear and I begged that we leave this place. I will never forget this: his anguish at this horror and what it represents. This was one of the low points in human history."

I asked, Why does God let things like this happen? They told me that God was very unhappy with the course of human history and was going to intervene to change the world. God had watched us sink to depths of depravity and cruelty at the very time that he was giving us the instruments to make the world a godlier world. God had intervened in the world many times before, but this time God was going to change the course of human events." (Howard Storm, My Descent Into Death, page 42,43)

Milgram experiment - Wikipedia

 

[DennisTate]

Satan's first line of attack is to create doubt (Genesis 3:1-4). When satan comes after you, turn to God.

I think that Lucifer Satan.... doubts himself........
and is extremely angry with himself for leading a revolt against G-d......
but once it got going it became somewhat like the Milgram Experiment.....
so he may as well play out his role as the Authority Figure.

 

[Hawkins]

Thank you so much for your response. I don't understand how to "hand over everything else to God". Everything else is a miasma of confusion, questions and opacity. I also have a panoply of questions about Christ himself, which I have omitted. I don't know how to believe something if I can't understand it. And not for lack of trying. Maybe I'm trying wrong.

It is rather simply. Do you understand quantum physics? Do you double about science simply because quantum physics makes no sense to you. Do you insist on you should understand every single bit of it in order to believe in science?

In my opinion, you are adapting a wrong approach in terms of faith. You don't need to insist on understanding everything in order to believe Jesus Christ, simply because you can't as a human understand everything.

It's not a good approach to insist on understanding quantum physics in full in order to have faith in science. Similarly, it's not a good approach to insist on understanding heaven and hell in full in order to have faith in Jesus Christ.

You can have double about quantum physics, just don't let it be a condition (or rather obstacle) for you to reject science as a whole. This should be the attitude in terms of Christianity as well as science.

 

[Serving Zion]

Hi OP, it looks like you got a bit fizzled out and haven't been back to the battle in the past week, but I know The Lord loves you because of the work He has been doing in you that led you here to say what you have said.

So in case He might lead you to wander back and see what happened after you left, I'd like to offer something for you to consider that hopefully will be useful to His work in you (1 Corinthians 3:6c).

@hedrick
I guess what I'm getting at is: I did not ask for this (as far as I know).

I do not want to be here, and I am terrified that I've had an immortal soul pushed on me which will exist in some form, forever. That's not fair.

Nobody actually asks to be born! - but the more important issue is that we are meant to be rejoicing and praising Him for it! .. and, all that He has provided in creation is ample for that -- if it was handled toward that end.

So the problem is not that life is given without our consent but that creation is being mishandled in a way that abuses us until we come to hate life and then resent God for having created it (Romans 8:18-22).

I want non-existence, and I've wanted it since I was 13. I spent ages 13-19 asking God every night to just put me back the way I was before birth. I gave up when I turned 20. The answer was no.

Brother, if only I could show you the bigger picture right now, then you'd see how this is the exact battle of the war.

There is a "coming of age" around 13, where many teens lose hold of that childlike resilience (Matthew 18:3) and a more adult-like attitude takes hold of them .. yet at the same time if they are loaded with suffering and never getting relief from having a loving heart in their life (eg: Proverbs 16:24, ie: Matthew 24:12), this is when they begin to carry an evil spirit - having taken root by resentment (Ephesians 4:26-27, Matthew 6:15). There is a great number of teens who carry such deep darkness of spirit because of this.

As they become aware of it, as you described, or even if others around them become aware of it, then they might find words that can help to change their mind so that they can have a more healthy perspective of the world, and in this way they have uprooted the evil spirit (Matthew 6:22, John 15:3).

In your case it sounds as though you haven't had the stamina that was needed in order to stay hopeful in your quest for healing beyond the age of 20.

I concur that God's realm is likely incomprehensible to our puny sheep brains, but I'm not even interested in finding out anymore. I just want out. Permanently.

I hear you bro, and I know the feeling. I also know how intense it can be, because our wrestle is a spiritual one. If you want to seek relief from your suffering from the experts who are not spiritual, they will turn you into a drooling zombie. Most take that road, but if you want to be victorious over it, you will need to endure and learn the depths of the knowledge (eg: Matthew 24:12-13, 1 Corinthians 9:25, Revelation 3:21).

I'm desperately searching for a reason to stay here.

How about Proverbs 21:12 and Proverbs 21:1.

 

[Done222]

@hedrick
I guess what I'm getting at is: I did not ask for this (as far as I know). I do not want to be here, and I am terrified that I've had an immortal soul pushed on me which will exist in some form, forever. That's not fair. I want non-existence, and I've wanted it since I was 13. I spent ages 13-19 asking God every night to just put me back the way I was before birth. I gave up when I turned 20. The answer was no. I concur that God's realm is likely incomprehensible to our puny sheep brains, but I'm not even interested in finding out anymore. I just want out. Permanently. I'm desperately searching for a reason to stay here.

That sounds suicidal. I do hope and pray that you're okay. Hang in there. God is much better than a lot of His followers seem to believe.

 

[LastAttempt]

But when Satan participates in the killing of somebody.........
and influences a group of people toward committing murder.....
could it be partly so that they can graduate to a much higher level?

Could the Devil..... at least to some degree... have good intentions for the long term?





Milgram experiment - Wikipedia

I would just like to point out that the Milgram experiment has been widely debunked and was mis-reported from the start for the sole purpose of creating controversy. It was scientifically sloppy and again, the reports were even fabricated in some cases.

 

[LastAttempt]

Satan's first line of attack is to create doubt (Genesis 3:1-4). When satan comes after you, turn to God.

I'm sorry I don't understand what that means. If my line of thinking makes more sense than another, I'm using logic, which is not a human construct.

 

[LastAttempt]

Look around at the world you live in, the universe. It's telling us something about why we are here, and it doesn't take a genius to work it out.

Everything in existence is in a giant relationship factory (One thing effecting another) For what exactly?
Maybe for the sole purpose of learning.
Why do we need to learn? Maybe for the sole purpose of having a relationship.

Which I thinks comes next.

Well, I'm not a genius and I don't have it worked out, so what does that make me? A sheep! That's what. Baa. Your "relationship factory" may be thought of as predation. Something pretty awful, yea? But death is the engine of life. /sarcasm-on What an amazing world! /sarcasm-off. I don't see what you're getting at about learning and relationships? And the maybes? I'm not interested in speculation, but it just occurred to me that it's all I've got.

 

[LastAttempt]

It is rather simply. Do you understand quantum physics? Do you double about science simply because quantum physics makes no sense to you. Do you insist on you should understand every single bit of it in order to believe in science?

In my opinion, you are adapting a wrong approach in terms of faith. You don't need to insist on understanding everything in order to believe Jesus Christ, simply because you can't as a human understand everything.

It's not a good approach to insist on understanding quantum physics in full in order to have faith in science. Similarly, it's not a good approach to insist on understanding heaven and hell in full in order to have faith in Jesus Christ.

You can have double about quantum physics, just don't let it be a condition (or rather obstacle) for you to reject science as a whole. This should be the attitude in terms of Christianity as well as science.

I see your point BUT, I'm not looking at minutia here. I'm looking at the big picture and I need it to make sense, or how could I believe it?! God seems to be all-or-nothing. Physics - not so much (you can experiment with it to answer questions).

 

[LastAttempt]

There is a "coming of age" around 13, where many teens lose hold of that childlike resilience (Matthew 18:3) and a more adult-like attitude takes hold of them .. yet at the same time if they are loaded with suffering and never getting relief from having a loving heart in their life (eg: Proverbs 16:24, ie: Matthew 24:12), this is when they begin to carry an evil spirit - having taken root by resentment (Ephesians 4:26-27, Matthew 6:15). There is a great number of teens who carry such deep darkness of spirit because of this.

Thank you so much for your reply. I've read this before. The first Matthew reference always struck me as saying "As long as you have the intellect of a child, willingly believing ANYTHING you are told, you'll get in. I want naivety ONLY." My adult brain can look back on my stupid, child brain and I just want to cry. What a waste of time.

I hear you bro, and I know the feeling. I also know how intense it can be, because our wrestle is a spiritual one. If you want to seek relief from your suffering from the experts who are not spiritual, they will turn you into a drooling zombie. Most take that road, but if you want to be victorious over it, you will need to endure and learn the depths of the knowledge (eg: Matthew 24:12-13, 1 Corinthians 9:25, Revelation 3:21).

I've been at this long enough I've stopped hoping for relief. I'd settle for even a little equilibrium. I don't want to "endure" ignorance, I want to understand. Actually, the more I think about it, the more I don't want to participate anymore anyway. Also, I have no idea what the verses concerning the "depths of knowledge" thing. Again, the bible's original languages contain the bible's real intention, which has been lost unless you are fluent in Aramaic, Classical Hebrew, Greek, some Latin AND the social context within which they were used over many, many years. Haven't you ever played operator? I don't understand 99% of what's in the bible and I don't exactly trust it - and it's not because I'm a stupider sheep than you. Probably. Maybe.

 

[LastAttempt]

That sounds suicidal. I do hope and pray that you're okay. Hang in there. God is much better than a lot of His followers seem to believe.

Yes, it is suicidal. I'm tired, which is why I'm here. If I had no one to mourn me, this would be a moot thread.

 

[hedrick]

Thank you so much for your reply. I've read this before. The first Matthew reference always struck me as saying "As long as you have the intellect of a child, willingly believing ANYTHING you are told, you'll get in. I want naivety ONLY." My adult brain can look back on my stupid, child brain and I just want to cry. What a waste of time.

I'm not sure that's what it means. In the NT, faith means primarily trust. Children tend to love and trust adults without limitation. I don't think however that Jesus intended to say we should be credulous.

The following gives a related idea: "so be wise as serpents and innocent as doves." The NT in general does say that we should test ideas.

 

[Serving Zion]

Thank you so much for your reply. I've read this before. The first Matthew reference always struck me as saying "As long as you have the intellect of a child, willingly believing ANYTHING you are told, you'll get in. I want naivety ONLY." My adult brain can look back on my stupid, child brain and I just want to cry. What a waste of time.



I've been at this long enough I've stopped hoping for relief. I'd settle for even a little equilibrium. I don't want to "endure" ignorance, I want to understand. Actually, the more I think about it, the more I don't want to participate anymore anyway. Also, I have no idea what the verses concerning the "depths of knowledge" thing. Again, the bible's original languages contain the bible's real intention, which has been lost unless you are fluent in Aramaic, Classical Hebrew, Greek, some Latin AND the social context within which they were used over many, many years. Haven't you ever played operator? I don't understand 99% of what's in the bible and I don't exactly trust it - and it's not because I'm a stupider sheep than you. Probably. Maybe.

Hi there, I remember having written this to you several weeks ago. It was after I had got a sense of how your thoughts had progressed, and as I knew you would think of me according to the relationship we had built, that I'm like you in a way. I really hate those who call themselves Christian, but who are of the antichrist (Jeremiah 23:30).

So, I see that momentum has been lost. This has happened before too, it is those damn sparrows that gobble up the seed before it has a chance to sprout. (I wouldn't speak so unkindly of them if they were cute, feathery and hopping around all innocent )

Anyway, you're not the same person today as you were that day. I don't have any really big ideas to help you with where you are at now. .. Though I could mention that Jesus didn't mean that we should be naive like a child (Matthew 10:16, Proverbs 25:26), but blameless - therefore not having to get crafty to explain our way out of things (Romans 16:19, Romans 12:1).

On a side note, did you ever see that movie Equilibrium? Just when you said that word it reminded me of it. It is one of my favourites - I should have to try and watch again!

 

[LastAttempt]

Nobody actually asks to be born! - but the more important issue is that we are meant to be rejoicing and praising Him for it! .. and, all that He has provided in creation is ample for that -- if it was handled toward that end.

So the problem is not that life is given without our consent but that creation is being mishandled in a way that abuses us until we come to hate life and then resent God for having created it

Wow, nail on the head. I see, we have mishandled creation which brings resentment. God knew this would happen. I find the notion of praising god for putting me here shocking. Thank you for putting me in the middle of this dumpster fire? Thank you for putting me down here knowing I don't want anything to do with this horrible place, or who/whatever made it? May I please leave? Thanks and everything, but no thanks. I can't be that important that the world couldn't do without me. Please don't think me recalcitrant; I really do want to experience what you have described - with the intellect of an adult.

 

[Serving Zion]

I really do want to experience what you have described - with the intellect of an adult.

We were on a roll heading in that direction, but we lost all that momentum while you were gone. (I'm not saying this to make you feel bad about it, but only to try and get the ball rolling again!).

... so, how come you went away for so long and then just came back? This investigation of yours was taking your every day before you went away. Was I right to assume that you had gotten worn out by the battle and just needed a breather, or was there something else that took you away for a while?